Gilas bags Silver in FIBA Asia, Castro still Asia’s best point guard

Gilas Pilipinas with a lot of heart and grit may have lost to the mighty Chinese squad 78-67 at the FIBA Asia Championship finals and missed automatic qualification for the Rio Olympics in August 2016, but it doesn’t mean the end of the road to the 2016 Olympic Games.

As one of the top four teams in the FIBA Asia contest, the Philippines (plus Iran and Japan) qualified to compete in one of 3 Olympic Qualifying Tournaments (OQT) that will happen in July 2016, a month before the Olympic Men’s Basketball tournament.

The 3 FIBA Olympic Qualifying Tournaments will pit 18 national teams from different FIBA regional events.

They will be grouped into three competitions of six teams and the winner of each tournament will each get a slot in the 2016 Summer Olympics in Brazil from August 6 to 21.